Yes, I know I forgot to turn the lights on, but I’m much too tired to record the video again!
UPDATE: The final result of the general election in Scotland –
SNP 48 (+13)
Conservatives 6 (-7)
Liberal Democrats 4 (n/c)
Labour 1 (-6)
Of course the SNP will immediately reduce themselves to 47 by depriving Neale Hanvey of the whip, but hopefully common sense will prevail and that state of affairs won’t last for too long. If the people of Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath think that Mr Hanvey is a fit and proper person to be their MP, it would be rather bizarre if the SNP conclude that he isn’t even fit to be a party member.
There was a frustrating run of narrow defeats towards the end of the night that just barely spared the waters of Loch Ness from a frightening ordeal, but really, it was incredible how close the SNP came to gaining seats like West Aberdeenshire & Kincardine and Caithness, Sutherland & Easter Ross – those weren’t even on my radar a few weeks ago. The failure to gain Moray and Banff & Buchan shouldn’t have been a surprise, because the Leave vote was stronger in those two seats and the outcome tonight is linked to the trend in Leave areas south of the border.
The fact that the Liberal Democrats delivered the goods in four of the five seats they were competing for makes Jo Swinson’s defeat look like a very personal one. If you lose your seat for the specific reason that your own constituents dislike you as a person, it’s safe to assume you don’t have much of a future as party leader. I would guess it’s only a matter of hours before she formally resigns. The Lib Dems must wish that Vince Cable had stayed on for a few more months. Ironically, if he had, Jo Swinson herself might still be an MP.
That said, it’s blindingly obvious that the Lib Dems owe their narrow gain in North-East Fife to a massive anti-SNP tactical vote by Tory supporters. There was a very clear correlation between the drop in the Tory vote and the increase in the Lib Dem vote.
The overall Scottish outcome will hopefully kill forever the idea that the SNP cannot confront the electorate with the issue of independence if they want to win elections. They shied away from making the case in 2017, but went in all guns blazing in 2019, and the contrast between the two results tells us all we need to know. Safety-first and blandness don’t inspire anyone.
Nicola Sturgeon has really got to use the tremendous moral mandate she now has to push relentlessly for an independence referendum to actually take place – a Westminster veto simply can’t be accepted, even tacitly. In the long run it’s not defeats you rue – it’s squandered opportunities at moments of triumph, and we can’t afford to let this opportunity slip through our fingers.
With three results to go, it looks arithmetically certain that the SNP’s share of the popular vote in Scotland (45%) is going to slightly exceed the Tories’ share of the UK vote (currently 43.6%). I’m sure that point will be made repeatedly, because if Johnson is claiming a mandate to deliver Brexit on his terms, it’s very hard to see how the SNP don’t have a watertight mandate to hold an independence referendum.
